Elephant Graveyard

the gathering of the end to itself

found;
the proper scope of air and light
/ to fill with
a celebration of birds

and do elephants, in their long slow dreams
scent a hazy polestar
not to know the place / but just the shadows it would cast

found.
the plain packed earth
to drumskin catch
that first breath to last momentum
thrown off a car-wreck’d life

gnash and flare, the wheels screech.
but / the spin goes ever on
            the spin the spin the spin the spin

                         goes vwhooming into earth
                         goes corkscrewing into air like smoke,
                                  around which vultures carousel

      and emphasize
           that certain slant of sunlight / in late afternoon
      so clear that you could swear / you see the air,
      and all the light inside it
      like yellow plates of glass

a softly burning bedsheet / strewn across the room

which clarifies the contours that it kisses
of the floorboards, the old chair,
as if they were
for the-first-real-time-alive

found (thump)
clear light like a knife
that in its shaft
cuts through the foamy rumors of the world
to incandescent bones beneath
that ring like tuning forks when struck

we go stumbling onto fleet cathedrals
of tented light unfolding ordinary rooms

dirt a death has swelled with blood
air a life has sharpened with last looks

and if you / are to die in bed
or in this kitchen, years from now,
is your house coiled round you
lovely with anticipations

for were there any other perfect nights of your silhouette
that you sat at kitchen table
with the overhead the only light on in the whole house
the first cool autumn winds / rattling outside
and a warm mug held in both your hands
            (steam spinning up into the light)

these premonitions of your dying / pose / the moments
bending time like light in water
to gift you glimpses of that room
as last it ever was

(for [you] were never quite so beautiful
as the last time that i saw [you])

wreathed soft
     in holy fire / of goodbye

Lucy Loftus lives on the foggy south coast of Massachusetts and can often be found wandering around graveyards there. She doesn't bite, hard.